Monday, February 28, 2011

Conehead enjoys the airport

Loyal readers of this blog will remember Conehead the Barbituate as a dedicated, if irregular, commentator on the posts of Carlo Sands. Conehead was also very kind to share with all of my fans his own personal cake recipe.

What my huge fan base may not realise is Conehead has come into some money through means I am really not at liberty to discuss in such a public forum (and one that is monitored so closely by 60 Minutes.)

No one quite knows where Conehead is or has been. In fact, no one really knows how the fuck he managed to catch his flight out of Sydney.

But the rumours are flying think and fast. The more reliable of them put Conehead first in Paris being chased onto a train out of there by Roma beggars who cleaned him out then tried to hit him up again after he went to an ATM — but not before Conehead was able to be infuriated by the arrogance of the French.

One story goes that even the lumpen elements in Paris have their standards and when one tried to scab a cigarette off Conehead at the Gare du Nord and Conehead offered him one of those weird black Gitane cigaettes that he couldn't wait to smoke in Paris, the guy said, “Gitanes? non!” and stomped off.

Further unconfirmed rumours put Conehead in Bonn, to his dismay and fury at being stuck in a place he is said by some to have described as the “Canberra of Europe, only more sterile”.

One of the stranger, less believable rumours suggested Conehead was flying into Western Sahara with a team of marathon runners, which would without a doubt provide for the quickest game of “spot the odd one out” in human history.

This is hard to believe, though it could be one of those prank TV shows where the presenter says “What Conehead doesn’t realise is there is no flight out of Western Sahara and he is going to have to run the marathon... Our hidden cameras will capture his effort and you can join our online poll about whether he will make the 500 metre mark before collapsing.”

I post here Conehead’s observant little sketch of airports, a masterpiece of social commentary and story-telling that begins by paraphrasing the best fucking poem ever fucking written by fucking anyone (also known as John Cooper Clarke’s “Chicken town”):

“The fucking plane is fucking lateYou fucking wait & fucking wait”

I post the rest below. It is important for the story to understand that there is more than one type of substance Conehead likes to chain smoke...

* * *

The worst thing is having already gone through passport control I CAN’T HAVE A FUCKING CIGARETTE

To tell the truth, I’m not really down with this passport control shit.

That's my impression of travelling. Like its fun & all that, except for the fucking passport control. And all that security shit where you have to put all your stuff like keys & money in trays and it goes through an x-ray & then because something goes beep they make you go somewhere else to get felt up or your bag rifled or whatever & you think I might need that money & keys & shit that are sitting over there in a fucking tray where any fucker could grab it.

Then you go through, the plane’s delayed, so you have to wait WITHOUT A FUCKING CIGARETTE!

Which leads to another question: as you, Carlo, observed in your gritty realist Western Sydney drama the thing you do if a bus or train is late & you want to make it come, what do you do? YOU LIGHT A FUCKING CIGARETTE!

So how can I make the plane not be any later when I can’t light cigarette because I’ve been through fucking passport control.

4 comments:

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My only question is WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?

Are you *sure* AlgaeCal Bone Health Program "combines all of the above advice"? Does it *truly* incorporate the need to fly to Western Sahara to run a marathon? Or the importance of fleeing down a platform station to escape from hoardes of Roma beggars?

Or the need to ensure you have the worst type of cigarretes when in Paris to avoid losing them all to scabbing lumpens?

Does it incorprate the need to smoke cigarettes to end unseemly waiting times? Does it Jack?

I am going to go out on a limb and say NO IT FUCKING DOESN'T!

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Firstly, I think Jack needs to take 莊雅和莊雅和莊雅和's advice.Secondly, I'm pleased to report that I've found an airport where you can smoke cigarettes after you've gone through security: Tindouf, in one of the more remote parts of Algeria, in the middle of the Sahara Desert in fact. I was happy to see not only were plenty of people lighting up inside the terminal buildings but any of them were uniformed officials. So I happily smoked the last of my fake Marlboros.All in all, quite an atypical airport. Looks very old-world, kind of expected to see Humphrey Bogart wandering passed (with a cigarette in his mouth of course.) Going through the first security my carry-on bag was taken apart. At first I couldn't work out what they were looking for, but they then they asked "Do you have any rocks?" And when they said "rocks" they meant rocks — this was not a code-word for drugs or anything like that — they meant stones, pebbles, boulders, that sort of thing. They were also looking for sand.Two things occurred to me. One was why the fuck would anyone want to put rocks in their luggage, the other was why would anyone care. Weirdly enough, however, the dilligent security officers seemed to uncover all sorts of rocks, pebbles, stones, etc, and sand, in the bags of marathon runners, which were duly confiscated (the stones and sand not the bags).The motivation for this attempted crime I think can be understood by the mentality of marathon runners. They like challenges. These are the sort of people who think running 42km is not enough of a challenge so they run 42km in the Sahara Desert. They're planning one in the Arctic next year. So obviously lugging lots of bags and suitcases around remote airports is way too unchallenging, so they fill any space in their bags with rocks and sand to make them heavier.Why the authorities try to stop them is harder to explain. Someone said something about them wanting to protect their natural resources but I didn't observe any shortage of stones. And sand seemed quite plentiful: I don't think they are in much danger of running out even if they let every visiting marathon runner take as much as they want.In case anyone is wondering what I was doing at a provincial Algerian airport with a planeload of the marathon runners the answer is pretending to be a journalist. I didn't manage to convince many people, however, except for Algerian immigrations authorities (who seem a bit unwelcoming towards journalists, not that I blame them).It goes without saying that all the rumours Carlo posted about me are … FUCK! THERE'S A WORD LIMIT FOR POSTS!

It goes without saying that all the rumours Carlo posted about me are untrue but I am interested if anyone knows of any NGOs who would be willing to sponsor some Parisian beggars to go to Australia to give workshops on entrepreneurial skills to our local beggars.The truth is I acquired some money through entirely legitimate but thoroughly dishonorable means (inheritance) so there was nothing to do but give up my lumpen lifestyle, buy a suit, and travel the world prentending to be various things that I'm not.To get on the plane to Tindouf, journalist seemed a better option than marathon runner. I don't think I would have even convinced the Algerian airport officials of that — for one thing they didn't find any rocks or sand in my luggage.While I may not have made a convincing journalist I did find out about the nightlife in the local refugee camps. Drinking tea is the most important recreational activity. But this is not your dunk a tea-bag in boiling water sort of tea but an elaborately made brew whose preparation involves boiling tea-leaves on a little open fire and pouring the contents from glass to glass from a great hight for hours.The result if you wait (& its extremely impolite not to wait) is very sweet and very strong. Among Bedouin people the most impolite thing you can do is refuse anything. Which is good news if you like very strong, sweet tea, camel meat or rare done goat's liver. The latter is given to guests at baby-namings & refusal would be particularly offensive. Baby-namings are a popular recreational passtime whereby new-born babies are named by lottery — potential names being represented by necklaces pulled out of a bowl of camel's milk.Rather cool culture if you ask me. I know you're not meant to put on weight in a refugee camp but I didn't want to offend anybody.Like anywhere, of course, there is juvenile delinquacy, and it was explained to me in one of my interviews that there was a problem with young people sitting around all day drinking tea and smoking cigarettes. This problem is being proactively dealt with through oreganising youth to be more socially engaged, readers will be pleased to hear.And it should be said that smoking cigarettes in these parts certainly qualifies as substance abuse. The only readily available cigarettes in the camps is a brand called "American Legend" which says on the packet "real American flavour". This is a lie. The flavour, similar to glue, unmistakenly points to Chinese origin. I should know, I used to live in Footscray. You can get a higher class of Chinese counterfeit cigarette, fake Marlboro's, if you are willing to spend a lot more money. These cost 200 dinars ($2.75 in Australian money).

About Me

Gentleman ranter. Proof that if you give a man a mask, he may tell you the truth, but give him enough beer and he'll shout it at you. My life-long ambition is to get more Twitter followers than Taylor Swift (last count, only 34,042,711 behind.) Follow me at @carlogrubsands to make an old man's dream come true.